Shed - Noun: A simple roofed structure used as a storage space or a workshop.

Although the delivery of the Shed was promised early afternoon, I knew with the certainty of any previously disappointed home delivery customer, that it would arrive considerably later that the agreed time. So when the driver rang me at 5.30 to say he was 30 minutes away I was not the least bit surprised. I gave him directions to the allotment and said we would see him there.  Our friend Ed had kindly offered to come and help us unload.

The Shed man was friendly and cheerful despite being on his own, and having to make 13 deliveries in one 

day (with us being the 13^th.) before making the 2 ½ hour journey back to his depot.

Having delivered of us one shed I casually asked how long he thought it would take us to build, his response was “about an hour”.

Well he is either deluded, a liar or has a strange sense of humour because it's now 4 days later and we still haven't finished.

Following instructions is never easy, but once we'd identified the various sized battens we could make a start. Floor first, then frame with double door. Steve and Ed accomplished this the first night.

The next evening (it had to be evening as we both work) we put up the wall panels. All this takes time as neither of us are the handyman type and distinguishing what screw to use took up most of the time.

The next stage was the roof....unfortunately we had not done a thorough job of ticking off the inventory and therefore found we had no roof battens. Slightly stressed I went in search of spare wood. There was no need as there are allotment angels in the form of Fred and Janet.

Fred , it turns out is one of those people that can do just about everything, not only did he have wood of the correct dimensions he also had know-how !

So whilst Janet made us a cup of tea, Fred and Steve put the roof on. There were also a few gaps where the shed sides didn't quite meet, Fred was able to make them disappear with a hefty swipe from his mallet.

By the time the roof was secured and we'd put in the perspex window it was dark , so we left the felting of the roof for the next day and hoped it wouldn't rain overnight.

We spent the next day finishing off.

We decided to insulate (I use the term loosely), by lining the shed walls with left over bubble wrap, we have then lined the walls with Hessian, the effect is very pleasing, plus the shed smells lovely.

I already had a small camping stove, I think I may have bought it the week we got the allotment, and we have brought an old table and few chairs from home.

As we were building our shed.......I really should stop calling it that, because although I may use it for potting up, or storing a few garden tools, it has become apparent to us that we will use more to sit down and have a cup of tea in, and we are anticipating guests as it will take many 'cuppas' to repay Fred and Janet for all their help and kindness to us.